What Are We But Our Memories?
by PseudonymA1
Summary: An introspective oneshot inspired by late night movies. Zoe considers how to deal with her memories. SPOILERS FOR BDM


I never was too good with emotions. Growing up, I figured I was a normal girl; later I found that I was a normal-girl-with-too-many-brothers. None of us were into "sharing our feelings." It was sappy and there were always more important things to do. It was the same when I enlisted. We were fighting every day, every night. We would watch comrades fall mid-sentence, and we would pick up their weapons and keep going. Nobody ever saw me cry. Hell, nobody ever saw me smile.

After the war, I wasn't too sure of myself. I kept going, walking in a haze, blindly following my sergeant. We were hurting deep. He had lost faith in the whole 'verse; I was losing faith in myself. But we kept going, kept walking. We found work where we could and never, ever showed each other our wounds. It's not that we didn't trust each other. No, it was more that we didn't trust ourselves. Mal wanted to appear to be in control, and letting out all his aching would've been detrimental.

I had just never learned how to say what I felt.

Until I met Wash, I'd resigned myself to that private kind of suffering.

It's not like he saved me. I was a grown woman, didn't need no saving. And it's not like he completed me or made me feel more alive. All he did was shake me out of the mindsets I'd settled for. Hoban Washbourne didn't try to make me change. He didn't look at me and say, "Zoë, you'll be so much happier if you just open up." He didn't knock on my door, he didn't beg to be let in.

Little by little he let me see what was below his surfaces. At first I was uncomfortable seeing him laugh so freely. I couldn't stand his unnecessary joy. We weren't on Serenity to joke around; we were there to work and get paid. Yet as the months passed, I found I couldn't help but laugh around Wash. With time, I discovered that my life had a little more color when I was with him.

We almost lost our little friendship the first time I saw him cry. He was lonely and something Mal said set him off. The two yelled and fussed at each other for hours. Then Wash retreated to the bridge. I had followed softly, not wanting to make things worse. When he turned to face me, there were tears in his eyes. The man was crying like a child, but he was not ashamed. I couldn't face that kind of openness.

He gave me a journal for my first birthday with him. We weren't yet dating, but he had begun to show me such sweetness. He explained the present to me on the bridge. I was standing just where I had been when I'd seen the tears. He was sitting cross-legged, never once dropping his gaze from my eyes.

"I know you've got a lot of hurting inside, and a lot of happiness too. And I know you don't like to let other people see it. If it helps you, you could try writing it down every once in a while. Just so that you don't let it bottle up."

Diaries were childish and I'd never kept one. But slowly, almost begrudgingly, the words came. I wrote almost constantly over those next six months, and when I had filled up the book, I realized something. My aching had gone away. To this day I don't know if it was that journal or Wash's friendship that kept me sane. Probably some combination of both.

When I admitted that to myself, I was able to love him the way he deserved. We married young and happy. Wash became my diary; he knew what I couldn't show.

Now there's nowhere for me to hide my hurting. No pages to comfort me and no hands to hold me. I am all alone and empty.

I wonder why I let myself remember him, when remembering hurts so much. Wouldn't it be better that I just forget it all? Forget the good times, so that I don't feel so alone. Forget the bad ones so that I stop regretting. Wipe my mind clean so I can begin again.

I considered it. I considered how sweet it would feel to have all the painful clouds erased from my mind. I could live on in eternal sunshine.

But I chose to live on with the burden of my memories. Without remembrance, life would be bleak. What are we but our memories? My life is irrevocably altered now—five years of marriage can do that to a person.

Wash never set out to change me, but I'll never be the same.


End file.
